The refusal to accept referees from 7 unnamed federations for the forthcoming Olympic Games in Istanbul as a sort of punishment for FIDE’s financial problems caused by the lawsuit in the name of Anatoly Karpov and these federations is by all means a very alarming precedent.

Defending a principal position in court is the right of any person as well as of any chess federation – member of FIDE. It is the basis of democracy and a guarantee of development of any organization. Moreover, the right to submit lawsuits is stipulated in FIDE’s Charter. Consequently, Anatoly Karpov and the federations which have appealed to court followed the civil norms and rights of any civilized society.

However, the statement and the intentions of Ali Nihat Yazici cannot be considered as such. His announcement sounds as if political differences are to intrude into the Game, not to mention the fact that the referees would lose their only source of income which is unfair play.

Taking into account the above mentioned, the Russian Chess Federation is appealing to Mr. Ilumzhinov for clarification. We would be interested to know if this statement is an official position of FIDE or Mr. Yazici’s personal initiative.
Anyway, the Russian Chess Federation strongly believes that the only acceptable course of action for FIDE would be to disavow the above statement, offer the job to the excluded referees and summon up the courage to apologize for the notorious statement to the chess federations and all chess fans across the world.